Queirós claimed the archipelago for Spain, as part of the colonial Spanish East Indies and named it La Austrialia del Espíritu Santo.

[12][14] Over time, it is thought that the Lapita either mixed with, or acted as pioneers for, migrants coming from the Bismarks and elsewhere in Melanesia, ultimately producing the darker-skinned physiognomy that is typical of modern Ni-Vanuatu.

[21] This linguistic hyperdiversity resulted from a number of factors: continuing waves of migration, the existence of numerous decentralised and generally self-sufficient communities, hostilities between people groups, with none able to dominate any of the others, and the difficult geography of Vanuatu that impeded inter- and intra-island travel and communication.

[26] The French landed on Ambae, trading with the native people in a peaceful manner, though Bougainville stated that they were later attacked, necessitating him to fire warning shots with his muskets, before his crew left and continued their voyage.

[31] In 1825, the trader Peter Dillon's discovery of sandalwood on the island of Erromango, highly valued as an incense in China where it could be traded for tea, resulted in rush of incomers that ended in 1830 after a clash between immigrant Polynesian workers and indigenous Ni-Vanuatu.

[12][32][33][34] Further sandalwood trees were found on Efate, Espiritu Santo, and Aneityum, prompting a series of boom and busts, though supplies were essentially exhausted by the mid-1860s, and the trade largely ceased.

[34] French planters also began arriving, beginning with Ferdinand Chevillard on Efate in 1880, and later in larger numbers following the creation of the Compagnie Caledonienne des Nouvelles-Hébrides (CCNH) I.

[34] The Convention of 16 October 1887 established a joint naval commission for the sole purpose of protecting French and British citizens, with no claim to jurisdiction over internal native affairs.

[44] At the peak of the deployment, some 50,000 Americans were stationed on the two military bases, outnumbering the native population of roughly 40,000, with thousands more Allied troops passing through the islands at some point.

With the successful reoccupation of the Solomons in 1943 the New Hebrides lost their strategic importance, and the Americans withdrew in 1945, selling much of their equipment at bargain prices and dumping the rest in the sea, at a place now called Million Dollar Point on Espiritu Santo.

[34] On Espiritu Santo, the Nagriamel movement was founded in 1966 by Chief Buluk and Jimmy Stevens on a platform of opposing any further land clearances and gradual, Ni-Vanuatu-led, economic development.

[34][48] Meanwhile, economic development continued, with numerous banks and financial centres opening up in the early 1970s to take advantage of the territory's tax haven status.

[34] The Condominium's Resident Commissioners decided to postpone the opening of the Assembly, though the two sides proved unable to agree on a solution, prompting protests and counter-protests, some of which turned violent.

[34][54][55] A compromise was eventually brokered, a Government of National Unity formed under a new constitution, and fresh elections held in November 1979, which the VP won with a comfortable majority.

Still ambivalent about independence, the French effectively neutered the force, prompting a collapse of law and order on Espiritu Santo resulting in large scale looting.

[34] The New Hebrides, now renamed Vanuatu, achieved independence as planned on 30 July 1980 under Prime Minister Walter Lini, with a ceremonial President replacing the Resident Commissioners.

[64] Since the 1991 general election, Vanuatuan politics have been unstable with a series of fractious coalition governments and the use of no confidence votes resulting in frequent changes of prime ministers.

He lost much support over a secret deal to recognise Taiwan in the China-Taiwan dispute and was unseated in a confidence vote less than five months after taking office, being replaced by Ham Lini.

There were frequent attempts by the opposition to unseat Natapei via the use of no confidence votes – though unsuccessful, he was briefly removed on a procedural technicality in November 2009, an action that was then overturned by the Chief Justice.

Salwai in turn lost the 2020 Vanuatuan general election amidst allegations of perjury, bringing back in the VP under Bob Loughman as the country dealt with the aftermath of Cyclone Harold and the global COVID-19 pandemic.

The fourteen of Vanuatu's islands that have surface areas of more than 100 square kilometres (39 sq mi) are, from largest to smallest: Espiritu Santo, Malakula, Efate, Erromango, Ambrym, Tanna, Pentecost, Epi, Ambae or Aoba, Gaua, Vanua Lava, Maewo, Malo and Aneityum or Anatom.

The islands have been logged, particularly of high-value timber, subjected to wide-scale slash-and-burn agriculture, and converted to coconut plantations and cattle ranches, and now show evidence of increased soil erosion and landslides.

Additionally, the lack of employment opportunities in industry and inaccessibility to markets have combined to lock rural families into a subsistence or self-reliance mode, putting tremendous pressure on local ecosystems.

More recently, new donors such as the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) of the United States and the People's Republic of China have been providing increased amounts of aid funding and loans.

[129] In September 2017, at the 72nd Session of the UN General Assembly, the Prime Ministers of Vanuatu, Tuvalu, and the Solomon Islands once again raised human rights concerns in West Papua.

[132] Concern was focused on the possibility that China would use Vanuatu's potential inability to repay debt as leverage to bargain for control of, or a People's Liberation Army presence at, Luganville Wharf.

[169] The country's economic development has been suspected to be hindered by dependence on relatively few commodity exports, vulnerability to natural disasters, and long distances between constituent islands and from main markets.

[171] Another attraction to scuba divers is the wreck of the US ocean liner and converted troop carrier SS President Coolidge on Espiritu Santo island.

[203] Villagers of the Yaohnanen tribe believed in an ancient story about the pale-skinned son of a mountain spirit venturing across the seas to look for a powerful woman to marry.

The ritual consists of men land diving off a 98-foot-high wooden tower with their ankles tied to vines, as part of the annual yam harvest festival.